Worcester slots proposal takes a pounding

Monday

Apr 8, 2013 at 11:00 PMApr 8, 2013 at 11:43 PM

By Steven H. Foskett Jr. TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

Members of a City Council joint subcommittee tonight implored more than 100 people gathered for a public hearing on the slots and hotel proposal for the Green Island neighborhood to limit remarks to what they want to see in a community host agreement.

What the Joint Committee on Economic Development and Public Safety got instead at the Hibernian Cultural Center on Temple Street were more than two hours of overwhelming opposition to even allowing the $240 million slots parlor to be built on the Wyman-Gordon property, off Madison Street.

To be sure, there were suggestions of what sort of mitigation City Manager Michael V. O’Brien should negotiate into the host agreement with Mass Gaming and Entertainment and Carpenter & Co., the joint venture seeking to build the slots parlor off Madison and a hotel in an as-yet-unspecified location downtown.

The most detailed suggestions for the host agreement came from people who live or work in and around Green Island.

“This is not our first choice,” said Lorraine Laurie of Dorchester Street. “If the residents had their way we would have a bank, a supermarket and a pharmacy there. We are not doing cartwheels over this.”

But if the voter referendum approves the host agreement and the slots parlor is constructed, the neighborhood needs to benefit, she said.

“What the island needs is a bank,” she said, adding that building out the Crompton Park master plan, additional police foot patrols and streetscape improvements would be welcome. Something also must be done with Kelley Square, which Mr. O’Brien described earlier in the hearing as being on the “National Register of Historic Traffic Problems.”

Harry Kokkinis of Table Talk Pies at Kelley Square also said long-standing traffic issues that will likely be exacerbated by a slots parlor need to be addressed. Public safety should also be a component of the agreement, he said, calling for the slots parlor to hire its own security force and foot patrols.

Supporters of the Canal District said they would like to see the host agreement include funding for recreating the Blackstone Canal, currently buried underneath the neighborhood.

Jeffrey Mararian, who owns several properties in the neighborhood, including the Blackstone Tap, said a fund should be set up “not for the things we know about, but for the things we don’t know about.”

He said he doesn’t see slots patrons “ever visiting our neighborhood,” and therefore said the only lasting benefit would be to have the canal reopened.

Jay Foley, owner of Foley Engines, suggested that the agreement include a deposit requirement for decommissioning should the slots operation fail.

There were a few supporters of the slots parlor proposal.

Todd Salmonsen said he looks forward to the investment in the community and the tax revenue, which District 2 Councilor Philip Palmieri said would jump from around $40,000 to $50,000 on the current property to $5 million to $6 million annually if the slots parlor is built.

Former City Councilor Michael Perotto also supported the more than 600 jobs the proposal could bring to the area.

“If you’re looking for tax money, $5 million to $6 million is significant to your budget,” Mr. Perotto said.

John Reed said he supported the project from an environmental perspective; he said it could be a change to “turn a brownfield into a green field,” and said the new building could include rain gardens and green roofs.

The most passionate remarks came in outright opposition to the project. Green Island resident Allan Fletcher said he has seen, in cities with gambling, the effects it has on communities. He said the gambling facilities are designed to be internally focused and self-contained, “very much like the mall we all fell in love with and spent a huge amount of money tearing down.”

He said Atlantic City, for example, is a “pathetic husk of what it once was” because of gambling.

Several residents said they feared spiraling crime rates, increased prostitution, and a spike in gambling addiction. Roberta Schaefer, president of The Research Bureau, said slot machines are known as the “crack cocaine” of the gambling industry.

After getting into a skirmish with District 5 Councilor William J. Eddy, Ms. Schaefer continued that she had a problem with the process in general. She asked why public input was being solicited on a host agreement that doesn’t even exist.

“Will voters understand what they’re voting on?” she asked.

Colin Novick said the mitigation is a short-term solution for long-term impacts, and Nicole Apostola asked why the city needed to negotiate mitigation if this is such a great project.

“How much are we willing to sell off this community to get some jobs that are not that great, to get an employer that is not that great?” she asked.

Former District 4 City Councilor Barbara Haller said that having vacant property in a neighborhood isn’t always the worst that can happen, and said people will always support less-than-desirable uses in neighborhoods they don’t live in.

To that end, at-large Councilor Konstantina B. Lukes, a vocal opponent of the proposal, said the agreement should include a residency requirement so the developers can “see what they are going to do to that neighborhood.”

Several people expressed concern about how union-friendly the slots operation would be, saying Mass. Gaming’s parent company, Rush Street Gaming, has a history of being anti-union. They also said Rush Street Gaming has a history of aggressively appealing property tax assessments, and urged the councilors to make sure the host agreement prevents the developer from reneging on it.

Other residents questioned the impact the slots would have on the city’s colleges, on the same day Assumption College President Francesco Cesareo took a public stand against the slots proposal.

Another hearing will be held at City Hall on April 17. According to Mr. O’Brien, once the host agreement is signed, the City Council would set a date for a referendum that would have to occur within 60 to 90 days.